


Damned Prince of Gotham

by RandomReader13



Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Eldrich Being Jason Todd, Gen, Gotham Is Alive, Joker gets fucking murdered like he deserves, Magic, Taking the "damned prince of gotham" too literally I guess?, idek, inspired by a tumblr post, this is a weird one guys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-03
Updated: 2020-06-03
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:27:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,299
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24527635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RandomReader13/pseuds/RandomReader13
Summary: Gotham is alive and its spirit rests in one Jason Todd
Relationships: Catherine Todd & Jason Todd
Comments: 21
Kudos: 234





	Damned Prince of Gotham

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by [this post](https://becausehetookmeawayfromyou.tumblr.com/post/619760280708218880/jason-is-gotham)

Jason was brought to Catherine with hair as black as night and eyes to match, shoved into her arms by a husband who wouldn’t say where he came from or why he was here. She could have refused, shouted that this child wasn’t her responsibility, demanded to know if he was cheating but, well, she had always wanted to be a mother. Why refuse the one thing she had always wanted? There was something about the boy that called to her, that made something deep within her rise up and snarl, _mine_. So she didn’t complain, she didn’t shout. She took the baby and gave him a warrior’s name, a healing name, a name of contradictions, everything she felt and didn’t know how to express.

She didn’t say anything when those black eyes lightened to blue. Wasn’t that normal for babies, for hair and eyes to shift as they grew? Willis left and didn’t come back when he came home one day to find Jason three shades darker than when he left that morning, the toddler’s hair springing from its straight, flat lines into fluffy curls. Catherine didn’t mind. Jason was still Jason, her little one who loved to snuggle on the couch and listen to Catherine read, no matter the color of his skin or the shape of his eyes.

When she came home one day to a young man instead of a rambunctious seven-year-old, she smiled and pressed a kiss to his forehead and told him to put away the groceries.

When he came out to breakfast one morning with a different body entirely, she clicked her tongue and wrangled (him? her? it was Jason and that was all that mattered) onto the couch so she could turn the wild mess of hair into neat pigtails.

The neighbors didn’t ask questions, but they kept their own children far away. Jason didn’t seem to mind. He was much more interested in counting bricks and scaling fire escapes than playing kickball or hide and seek. He never got hurt, so Catherine didn’t worry.

Sometimes Jason got sick, when maniacs cackled on the tv and bombs went off and gas filled the streets. During those days, Catherine pressed wet washcloths to his forehead and held him close and hummed while he cried, trying to keep the darkness away.

When Catherine died, a needle in her arm and poison in her veins, something ripped deep inside Jason. He was young that day, barely able to see the top of his head in the bathroom mirror if he stood on his toes. He was too small to lose his shield from the world. And Catherine was a shield, with her gentle hands and quiet voice and grounding presence. He hadn’t realized how loud the city could be until she was gone and it slammed into him with the force of a truck. His heart stopped, replaced by the undulating wail of sirens; the steady rasping of his lungs was replaced with the woosh of smokestacks, the gasp of those running for their lives or for joy; his tears ran black and polluted like the bay, the acid rain that wore away at stone and health and life.

A high-pitched scream alerted the neighbors that something was wrong. A cracking, wavering voice told the police that a woman had died. A young man walked out of the apartment building, a bag slung over his shoulder, and disappeared into the night.

* * *

Jason breathed the city; inhaling smog and dirt and fumes, exhaling screams and shots and breaking glass. The pulse of the city ran through his veins, a million lives held tight beneath his rib cage. Buildings bent over him, alleys twisting behind him into mazes of safety. The creaking floors of abandoned buildings never broke beneath him, his feet never slipped on fire escapes or rooftops, he was never lost, not even for a moment.

Jason felt the city like he felt his own body. Every pleading voice was a knife between his ribs, every gurgling death a hot iron to his feet. The laughter and joy and thrill of life was a balm layered over seeping wounds, never enough to silence the screaming nerves, the sobbing tendons of empathy stretched too thin.

Jason was the desperation of victims, the mad, wild rage of those hurt and hurting alike. Jason was the hope that refused to die from gas or guns or fire; he was the madness that stalked the streets and curled around his brain stem, begging for death and destruction and chaos. Jason was a child curled up on thin cardboard in a filthy alley, trying desperately to breathe through grief that cracked brick, pain that sent drain pipes crashing to the ground, the endless pounding and screaming and living and dying that thrummed through his body.

He learned how to lessen the pain. Every death was skin being flayed from his bones but the relief on the face of those he saved, the sudden spikes of joy and hope were enough that he kept going.

There were others with a similar mission, bats and birds that flocked through the air, flying over rooftops and bringing hope and light and Jason could breathe again, a little easier with more people than just him fighting the darkness. He never showed himself to them, avoided them with senses attuned to the fear they sparked, the pain of snapping bones. He watched as they clashed with the madness over and over again, watched as fear and destruction was never locked away for very long and only more powerful when it broke the bars holding it. He did not know how long he watched, only that people came and went and still the monsters waited in the dark. He waited and he practiced and he killed until he could breathe.

When the Joker broke free once again and spread death and pain through Jason’s bones, agony spiking through his jaw, Jason got up from his nest deep in the shadows of an alley that few could see and stalked towards the epicenter of the waves of panic gripping the city. He was strong now, strong enough that the city reached out before him, clearing a path, steering his people out of the way to safety. They never noticed, as short-sighted as they were. They thought it was their own idea to take a different, lit path, never even considered that someone had turned the lights off in dangerous streets with a blink of thought. If they noticed the way his body changed and shifted with every step, they knew better than to stare.

The city bent around him, subtle, soft, the encouragement of a thousand voices begging for their lives spurring him on.

The Joker was standing in the middle of the street, a bus filled with children behind him. He was blowing it up and it would not stop there. Jason knew, because he could feel the man’s madness in himself, could feel the longing to see the buildings around them explode in glorious chaos. The Bats were there, and Jason pushed them back with slippery footing and gusts of wind channeled through tall skyscrapers. This was the cause of so much pain, so much death, the splintering bones that didn’t let Jason sleep for weeks on end. It would end tonight. The Bats did not kill because they were not, could not be, judge, jury, and executioner. Jason could. Jason _was_. Jason was the heartbeat of a million people racing in terror, the marrow of thousands burning with rage against this man who ruined them time and again. Jason was Gotham and he stood before the madness and condemned it to death with the thunder of a thousand wills and hearts and minds.


End file.
